Talking about Sex: Notes on First Coitus and the Double Sexual Standard

Building upon the sexual socialization ideas of Gagnon and Simon and others which have stressed male-female differences in premarital sexual behavior, the social and psychological management of the first coital experience is examined. Using data from a 1967 national sample of university undergraduates, the idea of a double standard is explicated in terms of reportage about first coitus-to whom the person reports the event, how many people, how soon, and the like. Evidence pointing to a pattern of ego-sex emerges within the context of the so-called male bond (male peers as audiences for sexual prowess), which contrasts sharply with the modal females's management of first coitus. The paper concludes with a brief discussion of future trends in gender styles and premarital sexuality. If we rid much of what has been written on sexual socialization of its polemical bent, and look at certain underlying themes, a fairly coherent and plausible view of versus female sexual learning is emerging. Especially from the sociological, social-psychological, and neo-psychiatric viewpoints, the importance of puberty as a pivotal event having different meanings in two sexual socialization subcultures, the latter reinforced by the closeness of community, religiosity, and home-reinforced traditionalism, has supplanted earlier theories which took their leads from childhood experiences, primal family dynamics, and subconscious states.